Today I go into my Workflow for making a  podcast episode.

Here is my checklist:

  1. Shownotes - Everyone has trouble with shownotes but I my system, I get them done first. Using Google Docs I make a new document with the number of the show and save it to my bookmarks bar in my browser. That way, when I have an idea for my next show, I open that doc and write it down or drop a link or whatever in there.
  2. Show prep - I take that document and organize it and open any links in my browser. Normally just an outline or highlights of what I want to talk about and in the correct order I want to do.
  3. Get my recording software and equipment turned on and test. I record several test recordings making sure nothing changed in my setup. I try to get the recording levels at -12 to -3 on the meter.
  4. Record the intro segment
  5. Record the other segments for the podcast. I do it this way, but there is no reason you can't do all the segments, or the whole thing "live to the hard drive" as we used to say.
  6. I open a multi-track session that has my intro and outro (not the one I recorded, but the one with the real announcer voice and music)
  7. I place the intro I recorded and the segments in place and line them up the way I want.
  8. I drop in the bumper music (if I use bumper music for that episode) in between the segments.
  9. I check the transitions making sure everything sounds good.
  10. I render it out into a Wav File. In the case of this episode that wav file is called "phd077_mixdown.wav"
  11. I run that wav file though Auphonic making sure it stays as a wav. That file is called "phd077_mixdown_auphonic.wav"
  12. I open the auphonic wave file in Audition and check listen to bits and pieces to make sure nothing went wrong.
  13. I save that file from audition as an mp3 file. 44.1khz , 128kbps stereo.
  14. I upload to blubrry hosting using the uploader in PowerPress which writes my ID3 tags to the mp3 file for me.
  15. Paste the show notes from the doc into the WordPress post.
  16. Title the post and publish

That's it.

Next week I will talk about what to check to make sure your feed is working correctly and your audio is sounding the way you want it.

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